Molasses wash question

Sugar, and all about sugar washes. Where the primary ingredient is sugar, and other things are just used as nutrients.

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swpeddle
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Molasses wash question

Post by swpeddle »

Hey all,

Just a quick question regarding a molasses wash. I was planning to start with a 5kg jug of fancy molasses and then top up with white sugar. (I am using a regular 5gal bucket for the ferment) From the recipes on the site, and here, I would estimate that I would probably need an additional ~4kg of sugar. My first question is: What SG should I be shooting for before I pitch my yeast (EC1118)?

My second question is: do I need to add anything like paste for extra nutrients or lemon juice to help with PH? If I only need to adjust the PH would vinegar or straight citric acid do? It'd be alot easier/cheaper for me to get than lemon juice.

Thanks
Steve
swpeddle
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Post by swpeddle »

[quote="theholymackerel"]The molassas will supply all the nutrients that ya need, but you will have to make sure the PH is low enough.

I wouldn't use vinegar to adjust PH, citric acid is OK. I allways just use lemons or limes.[/quote]

So from what you're saying and the site, I'd figure for maybe 3-4g of citric acid per carboy? So 3g of citric acid would be about what? Maybe a tsp?
knuklehead
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Post by knuklehead »

To me something just seems wrong about using vinegar for acidity. I also would only use fruit acids. If I may I would like to make one suggestion swpeddle, make a 1 liter batch of wash with the same or lower SG as you intend to make your full batch 1 or 2 days before you are going to start your full wash. Use only half of this small wash and then rehydrate 10 grams of EC-1118 champagne yeast and when the bottle with the 1/2 liter wash is down under 40 C toss in the yeast. This yeast start quickly to a violent ferment since there is so much yeast and not so much sugar. The second 1/2 liter will be to feed the yeast once it runs out of sugar. In under 24 hours you will need to feed them again and they will start up hard again working on the sugar. So now you will have around 3/4 liter of yeast culture and the yeast will have reproduced making you more then you started with. Make your 20 liter wash and when it is down to temperature take the cultured yeast bottle, shake it up good to give them oxygen and pitch in about 1/2 a liter of cultured EC-1118 into your molasses wash. Seal the lid and attach your airlock and these hungry bugs now having a world of sugar to work on will take off like wild fire. Now you can add the other 1/4 liter of wash to the culture bottle, shake it up again and this time you can put it in the fridge to slow the bugs down. I made a small airlock much like the ones you can buy out of a pill container, 1/4" plastic hose and a plastic bottle cap which I glued to a coke bottle cap. In the fridge the yeast will still reproduce and ferment. Keep feeding the yeast a little at a time shaking the culture to aerate and then replacing the airlock when the ferment slows down and you can keep growing your own yeast. Next batch you can take it out of the fridge 24 hour before you want to start your wash and then when its ready pitch in some culture leaving about half in the bottle and so on. My molasses usually finishes in 3 days with the same yeast. Then a few days to settle. I have had very good luck using this process.
... I say God bless you, I don't say bless you ... I am not the Lord, I can't do that ...
Dane Cook
nzbourbonhead
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Post by nzbourbonhead »

knuklehead wrote:, make a 1 liter batch of wash with the same or lower SG as you intend to make your full batch 1 or 2 days before you are going to start your full wash. Use only half of this small wash and then rehydrate 10 grams of EC-1118 champagne yeast and when the bottle with the 1/2 liter wash is down under 40 C toss in the yeast. This yeast start quickly to a violent ferment since there is so much yeast and not so much sugar. The second 1/2 liter will be to feed the yeast once it runs out of sugar. In under 24 hours you will need to feed them again and they will start up hard again working on the sugar. So now you will have around 3/4 liter of yeast culture and the yeast will have reproduced making you more then you started with. Make your 20 liter wash and when it is down to temperature take the cultured yeast bottle, shake it up good to give them oxygen and pitch in about 1/2 a liter of cultured EC-1118 into your molasses wash. Seal the lid and attach your airlock and these hungry bugs now having a world of sugar to work on will take off like wild fire. Now you can add the other 1/4 liter of wash to the culture bottle, shake it up again and this time you can put it in the fridge to slow the bugs down. I made a small airlock much like the ones you can buy out of a pill container, 1/4" plastic hose and a plastic bottle cap which I glued to a coke bottle cap. In the fridge the yeast will still reproduce and ferment. Keep feeding the yeast a little at a time shaking the culture to aerate and then replacing the airlock when the ferment slows down and you can keep growing your own yeast. Next batch you can take it out of the fridge 24 hour before you want to start your wash and then when its ready pitch in some culture leaving about half in the bottle and so on. My molasses usually finishes in 3 days with the same yeast. Then a few days to settle. I have had very good luck using this process.
ok what' how much and how often do you need to feed this plant and I presume you could even split this in two similar to a ginger bear plant after a while?
Hic hic Now where did I put my glass
swpeddle
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Post by swpeddle »

[quote="knuklehead"]To me something just seems wrong about using vinegar for acidity. I also would only use fruit acids. If I may I would like to make one suggestion swpeddle, make a 1 liter batch of wash with the same or lower SG as you intend to make your full batch 1 or 2 days before you are going to start your full wash. Use only half of this small wash and then rehydrate 10 grams of EC-1118 champagne yeast and when the bottle with the 1/2 liter wash is down under 40 C toss in the yeast. This yeast start quickly to a violent ferment since there is so much yeast and not so much sugar. The second 1/2 liter will be to feed the yeast once it runs out of sugar. In under 24 hours you will need to feed them again and they will start up hard again working on the sugar. So now you will have around 3/4 liter of yeast culture and the yeast will have reproduced making you more then you started with. Make your 20 liter wash and when it is down to temperature take the cultured yeast bottle, shake it up good to give them oxygen and pitch in about 1/2 a liter of cultured EC-1118 into your molasses wash. Seal the lid and attach your airlock and these hungry bugs now having a world of sugar to work on will take off like wild fire. Now you can add the other 1/4 liter of wash to the culture bottle, shake it up again and this time you can put it in the fridge to slow the bugs down. I made a small airlock much like the ones you can buy out of a pill container, 1/4" plastic hose and a plastic bottle cap which I glued to a coke bottle cap. In the fridge the yeast will still reproduce and ferment. Keep feeding the yeast a little at a time shaking the culture to aerate and then replacing the airlock when the ferment slows down and you can keep growing your own yeast. Next batch you can take it out of the fridge 24 hour before you want to start your wash and then when its ready pitch in some culture leaving about half in the bottle and so on. My molasses usually finishes in 3 days with the same yeast. Then a few days to settle. I have had very good luck using this process.[/quote]

Would you believe that I already started doing this? :) I only had one pack of 1118, which i figured wasn;t quite enough to kick start the wash ALA turbo's do. As a result, I made a 750ml bottle of molasses wash with a sg of around 1.10, pitched the packet and it's been going well now for two days. I had planned to pitch the whole thing into my carboy, and just buy a new packet of yeast for next time, but I may save some starter as you suggested.

I do have some questions though: How often do you feed your yeast colony in the fridge? Do you keep it on the top shelve or the bottom? Have you had any issues with contamination? How many times to you use the same colony?
knuklehead
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Post by knuklehead »

Just make sure that you are careful to keep everything sterile that will touch the inside of the culture container. By this I mean when you feed the culture take it out of the fridge along with the bottle of wash. Make sure you sterilize a bottle cap so that once you have added more wash you can install the bottle cap and shake the hell out of it to aerate it. You can use the same culture for as long as you want. The yeast will keep multiplying in the culture and then when you use up some of the culture, feed it again, put it back in the fridge and it will reproduce again. It will be noticeable when you see the yeast settling out that there always seems to be about the same amount that you started with. As for feeding, I just keep an eye on it in the fridge. It will keep fermenting even at the cold temperature it will just be slower. I take the bottle out and listen to see if it is still fizzing and how much it is fizzing. I look at the amount of bubbles breaking on the surface and compare it to what it looked like when it started. Lastly, I have a good idea of how much yeast should be in the culture and by this I mean the amount that will have settled when it is done. As you know when the yeast has fermented all the sugar it will settle out. In the clear bottle you will be able to see to what extent it is settled It will start to settle down in a loose deposit on the bottom and that is when I feed it again. You don't want to wait till it is a packed deposit on the bottom because then you will have lost a lot of cells. Its not that big of a deal as long as you feed it right always then. The dead cells will act as nutrient anyhow. Speaking of which, that is what I have used for nutrient. The settled yeast form the bottom of the fermenter after I run. I just put it in a glass and boil it in the microwave to kill anything still living and use it in the wash as nutrient. I have now used the same culture for 7 -20 liter washes. That translates to $1.50 Canadian for the yeast in 140 liters of wash. I don't do it to save the 75 cents a packet I do it because of the huge amount of yeast I can pitch and how quickly it starts and finishes. And it's really no work at all.
I should add one more thing. Take it out of the fridge a day before you intend to use it to get it going strong again and also to warm it up as to not have to much temperature differance between the new wash and the culture. Also, keep your feed wash in the fridge as well and feed it the wash that is the same temperature as the culture is. To big of a temperature differance puts a lot of stress on your bugs.
... I say God bless you, I don't say bless you ... I am not the Lord, I can't do that ...
Dane Cook
nzbourbonhead
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Post by nzbourbonhead »

I presume you are only adding sugar? How much at a time?
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knuklehead
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Post by knuklehead »

I have a bottle in the fridge with a small amount of wash in it. I usually remove one liter of a wash I made up and use that as feed. You can't just add sugar to the yeast it has to be dissolved in water and I don't just add sugar water. I use exactly what I put in my wash, molasses, sugar, nutrient, acid and beano so the yeast gets an appetizer of just what it will be feasting on when I pitch it.
... I say God bless you, I don't say bless you ... I am not the Lord, I can't do that ...
Dane Cook
swpeddle
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Post by swpeddle »

[quote="knuklehead"]I have a bottle in the fridge with a small amount of wash in it. I usually remove one liter of a wash I made up and use that as feed. You can't just add sugar to the yeast it has to be dissolved in water and I don't just add sugar water. I use exactly what I put in my wash, molasses, sugar, nutrient, acid and beano so the yeast gets an appetizer of just what it will be feasting on when I pitch it.[/quote]

Ok. I think I can figure out where you're coming from. Bascially, be nice to the yeast and it'll be nice to you. However, I also had a concern about the yeast going through too many generations and the effect that would have on the efficiency, taste etc. Any thoughts?

Plus I was planning to do a molasses (fancy) only wash. I am pretty sure there should be sufficent sugar/nutrients in that wash and I can see the need of acid for PH balance, but the beano has me confused. I had always thought that beano was a combination of enzymes that worked on undigestible starches present in grains/legumes. Meanwhile, doesn't molasses only have a bunch of sucrose and higher molecular wieght sugars that aren't digestable by the yeast? So gievn that, what would those beano enzymes do to the sugars in molasses?

Thanks
Steve
PS don't worry about the CAN$ conversions. I am writing from CA as well.
knuklehead
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Post by knuklehead »

I have done fancy molasses batches and this molasses was 80% sugar so then there is not really a need for additional sugar. This fancy was costing my almost $4.00/kg so my 20 liter wash was costing me around $16.00 per wash and then the spices on top of that. Recently I picked up a 25kg bucket of blackstrap feed molasses and it cost me $22.00 but it only has 49% sugar that is why I add the the extra sugar. My Fancy batches fermented down almost back to 1.000 SG which really surprised me. My blackstrap batches only ferment down to around 1.020 SG so I need the extra sugar to get the % up. Blackstrap has a much stronger flavour so I think it all balances out and the price is much better. Now about the beano, I was chatting with a someone on this site who I have a lot of respect for on distilling and he told me to check the ingredients label on my bucket of molasses. He told my I would find starch in the ingredient list and that he always added beano to his blackstrap washes. I found it on the ingredients list and I took his advise.
... I say God bless you, I don't say bless you ... I am not the Lord, I can't do that ...
Dane Cook
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